Energy delivery from a distance involves transmission of energy waves to affect a target some distance away. It allows for more efficient delivery of energy to targets and greater cost efficiency and technologic flexibility on the generating side. For example, cellular phones receive targets from towers close to the user and the towers communicate with one another over a long range; this way, the cell phones can be low powered and communicate over a relatively small range yet the network can quickly communicate across the world. Similarly, electricity distribution from large generation stations to the users is more efficient than the users themselves looking for solutions.
In terms of treating a patient, delivering energy over a distance affords great advantages as far as targeting accuracy, technologic flexibility, and importantly, limited invasiveness into the patient. In a simple form, laparoscopic surgery has replaced much of the previous open surgical procedures and lead to creation of new procedures and devices as well as a more efficient procedural flow for disease treatment. Laparoscopic tools deliver the surgeon's energy to the tissues of the patient from a distance and results in improved imaging of the region being treated as well as the ability for many surgeons to visualize the region at the same time. Perhaps most important is the fact that patients have much less pain, fewer complications, and the overall costs of the procedures are lower.
Continued advances in computing, miniaturization and economization of energy delivery technologies, and improved imaging will lead to still greater opportunities to apply energy from a distance into the patient and treat disease.